Hon Yoyo Emmanuel

Presidential Plan for the Reconstruction of the Northwest and Southwest Regions

"What the Minister said cannot work in the present Context"- Hon Yoyo Emmanuel 

By Francis Ekongang Nzante 

Against a backdrop of wide and varied reactions towards the Presidential Plan for the Reconstruction of the Northwest and Southwest Regions, Honourable Yoyo Emmanuel, erstwhile SDF MP has said the approach of Minister Paul Tassong in the Reconstruction and Development Plan cannot work in the present context. He was Speaking recently in Bamenda, the Northwest Regional Capital in an encounter with a battery of journalists who sort to know his take on the issue which has sparked off multiple arguments.

Hon Yoyo Emmanuel insisted that during the Minister's visit he clearly stated the impossibility of carrying out the project under the prevailing circumstances. Hear him; "you cannot talk of Reconstruction and Development when there is violence and insecurity in the whole Region. That is why I cited the Babadjou-Bamenda Road which has not been constructed up till now whereas it was launched more than three years ago. It is because of insecurity."

Hon Yoyo Emmanuel quoted other projects in the region which had been abandoned because of insecurity. He said in his village in Ngoketunjia Division there was a road project worth about 600 million FCFA which had not been executed since it was approved two years earlier. The reason he said was simply insecurity.

"I pointed out to the Minister that the Government and the Separatists are not on the same wavelength on what should be done here. They need to reconcile and I don't need to be the one to tell them how to go about it but I know that the Government has to reconcile with the Separatists. It may be by granting them a Federal System or by any other means. But I know that in the present context you can't carry out this programme of reconstruction."

The erstwhile MP painted a scenario depicting a situation in which buildings were being destroyed behind as construction went ahead. He said if this was to be the case then nothing would have been achieved at the end adding that if an evaluation estimated at 90 Billions FCFA was already carried out some time in the past then the estimates were presently inaccurate because destruction was still going on. 

Describing it as "putting the cat before the horse" Hon Yoyo Emmanuel said if they went ahead with it then it would not be in the interest of the people. 

Citing the case of cattle that had been lost during the crisis, he wondered how they arrived at that figure. "I wondered whether they included mine because I am a cattle Farmer. I lost so many of them and nobody ever came to me to ask if I lost anything.  Everything is being done too hurriedly. What they should have done was to evaluate the damages done up to a certain point and then vote a budget which would carry out reconstruction up to that point. Then afterwards they might be looking for money to reconstruct other things that might have been destroyed along the line. This is the way I look at it and the Minister seems to have understood to an extent the seriousness of the points I put forth." 

Commenting on the Minister's modus operandi that the Presidential Plan for Reconstruction and Development of the two restive regions was a step towards peace he said "reconstruction cannot be a step towards peace but it is peace that should be a step towards reconstruction. When there is peace then there can be reconstruction. You cannot construct when there is violence with nobody having confidence in his neighbor."


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